"You should've left me." The confession tears out of me without permission. "Back in Azhgar. At the temple. Any of it. You should've walked away and let me figure it out alone."
"Never."
The single word carries absolute finality. No hesitation, no doubt, no room for negotiation.
"I'm slowing you down. Making everything harder." Tears I refuse to shed burn behind my eyes. "You'd be better off?—"
"Stop." He settles me more securely in his arms, and I feel his heartbeat against my cheek. "I'm exactly where I choose to be."
He settles me against the crumbling concrete wall of what might have been a storefront once, his cloak wrapped around both of us like a cocoon. The skeletal remains of the building provide some shelter from the wind, but cold seeps through every gap in the broken walls.
"Better?" His breath forms small clouds in the frigid air.
I want to say yes, to give him something that resembles reassurance, but the world keeps shifting around the edges. Shadows move where they shouldn't. The twisted metal overhead flickers like flames.
"Maedra?" I whisper, turning toward a corner where gray-green skin seems to materialize from nothing. "You're supposed to be dead."
Vargath's arms tighten around me. "There's no one there."
But I see her clearly—stooped shoulders, ritual scars, that knowing smile she wore when she spoke of divine flames. She gestures toward my belly with hands that smell of ash and herbs.
"The gods haven't forgotten," she says in her crackling voice. "Even when their people do."
"Seris." Vargath's hand cups my face, forcing me to meet his eyes. "Look at me. Only at me."
The vision dissolves, leaving only broken concrete and rusted rebar. I blink hard, trying to anchor myself in reality, but exhaustion pulls at my consciousness like undertow.
"I can't tell what's real anymore."
"I'm real." His thumb traces across my cheekbone. "The baby's real. Everything else can wait."
Another flicker of movement catches my peripheral vision—firelight dancing between the skeletal trees, impossible warmth in this frozen wasteland. I turn toward it instinctively, and Vargath follows my gaze to the empty forest.
"What do you see?"
"Fire. Light." The words feel thick on my tongue. "Like the flames outside the temple. The ones that burned for us."
He pulls me closer, sharing his warmth as wind whistles through the broken walls. "Are you scared?"
The question surprises me with its gentleness. Vargath doesn't ask vulnerable things—he states facts, issues commands,makes declarations. But fear threads through his voice now, barely contained.
"Are you?"
A long pause stretches between us, filled only by the sound of snow hitting broken glass.
"I've never been more afraid in my life."
The admission breaks something open in my chest. This warrior who faced down councils and cut through enemies without flinching—he's terrified. Of losing me. Of losing the baby. Of making the wrong choice.
"Because of me?"
"Because I don't know how to save you." His voice cracks on the last word. "I can fight anything with teeth and claws, but I can't fight this."
I lean deeper into his warmth, feeling his heartbeat against my back. "Then don't fight. Just stay."
Above us, snow continues falling through the broken roof, each flake catching what little light remains. Vargath shifts slightly, and I hear him whisper something in old orcish—words I don't recognize but understand in my bones.
"What are you doing?"
